


Rows of Empty Houses

by Alessgrosskid (thatonegrosskid)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, I WILL add more tags as they apply but i dont wanna tag spam rn ;-;, Runaway AU, Shoplifting, Slice of Life, also snape is indian/russian and no one can stop me!!, and uhh dealing with being 14 year olds living alone, completely platonic and comfy sev and lily, lily is sort of a gremlin! i don't make the rules!, money issues, oh yeah sev has a really good relationship of lucius and narcissa, sort of ooc but what are you gonna do about it?, they think hes great, this could be angsty but i cant write angst so its mostly them just trying to live
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-25
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:02:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26644927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatonegrosskid/pseuds/Alessgrosskid
Summary: Severus and Lily run way the summer after 3rd year, ready to make it on their own until their old enough to run away from wizarding Britain entirely.[AKA: Follow Severus Snape and Lily Evans making it on their own for the next 11 weeks and 2 days! After that? WHO KNOWS!]
Relationships: Lily Evans Potter & Severus Snape, Lucius Malfoy & Narcissa Black Malfoy & Severus Snape, background narcissa/lucius, uhh probrably eventual reverus
Comments: 6
Kudos: 19





	1. Waking Up to a Silver Sun

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this almost all at once and i did not beta it so uhhhhh pls take this i promise it gets better?

Two women stood on different sides of platform 9 3/4. One stood on her own, apart from the rest of the crowd, tall and stiff with proud eyes, her dark hair half covering a deep bruise across her jaw. The other leans comfortably against her husband, watching the train roll up excitedly with her daughter beside her. Both women watch the students file out of the train, meeting and leaving with their parents, the platform emptying out family by family until no one is left. They miss the two hooded figures sneaking from the train with the rest of the hoard,

They both watched, faces slowly falling as the last few children stumbled out of the train, and it slowly pulled out of the station. 

*

_ June 14th, 1975 _

Severus woke up with the sun, as he tended to, the pale light streaming through the clear patches of his dusty widow and right into his eye. He froze, half expected to open his eyes and see his familiar threadbare blanket, peeling wallpaper and yellowed ceiling. Still, he pulled himself up to see he was sleeping on the bare floor of a room notably bigger than his own, but dusty and barren. Instead of his blanket, he had covered himself with his school robes (noting sleepily that they were actually warmer than his blanket) and laying beside him, still snoring softly, was his best friend, Lily Evans.

He stood slowly, softly, making sure not to wake her, padding out of the room and down the stairs, into the silent, dusty living room and over to their trunks. He dug through his things to find clothes, careful not to disturb the sleeping owl in the corner, slipping into his muggle T-shirt and jeans right there in the room (just so lily didn’t wake up to him walking around in his boxers). 

Severus would have liked to start the day with something to eat, but he checked their trunks and all they had brought was water bottles, whatever they could buy off the train and bread and peanut butter from a nearby store (obviously not one they their parents went to.) he figured they should save what they could for as long as they could, at least until they got some more cash, and grabbed a bottle of water. He was much more used to going without than Lily was.

He took a while to drink and stretch and let his stomach settle, then he set off to work, grabbing his trunk and carrying it up to the second bedroom, small and familiar. He opened the window, straining against the rust and caked on grime, and got to emptying all of his potion supplies. Some he bought, some he stole over the course of the school year, some (especially the finer ingredients) he had Narcissa to thank for. She and Lucius were always willing to order him what he needed in return for say, homework help or an alibi for them to sneak out at night. 

He tried to be quiet while he set up his would be lab, but he was barely done hanging and laying out his ingredients when he heard soft steps come into the room. 

“Sev?” Lily leaned against the door, the school robes she slept under hanging off her shoulders, “Do you need any help?”

“No, I’m fine,” He assured her, using the last of their tacks to pin a bundle of dried gillyweed to the wall, “I’m about done, you should go down and get some food. Put on some clothes.”

She nodded, snorting at him at the mention of putting something on. She pulled the robes tighter around herself, hiding the sleepshirt and boxers beneath them, “oh, but you know I just  _ love  _ this draft.”

He stuck his tongue out at her, but she had already left. 

  
  


A while later and he came downstairs, ruffling his hair as he stretched his arms. He liked his things in a particular way and having to set them up as best as he could on the floor didn’t do anything good for his back. 

He couldn’t find Lily, so he figured she was out back at the toilet, instead heading towards the now awake and curious barn owl. He took an envelope from his pants pocket, address on the front freshly dried (he didn’t know where they would be staying until they got there) and handed it to the bird. 

“Will you take this to Lucius Malfoy?” He asked, trying to keep his voice steady. Lily’s owl genuinely scared him. 

It watched him for a long moment, eyes large and unnerving, before it’s beak shot out and grabbed the letter from him, almost taking his hand with it, flew up the stairs and presumably, out the open window in his lab. Great. Terrifying. 

He grabbed his water battle from before off the ground and brought it to the small kitchen, refilling it in the tap. The water was cleaner than he expected it to be, certainly, but he dumped it anyway, resolving to boil their tap water from then on. It hadn’t taken him long to rig the water up the night before, the small amounts of wandless magic helping the experience he already had from the times his father was just a bit too behind paying the bills and he had to go out and help him get their water back on until he could round up the money to pay. 

Well, to boil water, they would need a stove. Or at least, a fire. He looked over the stove and oven critically. He may have been able to get the water going, but he didn’t trust himself to even touch the gas lines, and even if they got the money to, they wouldn’t be able to pay a gas bill. Imagine going to some municipal office and asking them to turn on the gas at an abandoned home in an abandoned neighborhood. Even ignoring the fact that they were only 14, they would probably be attested for squatting or attempted terrorism or something.

The electricity would be about the same. Even if they  _ could  _ get it on, in his experience, magic and electricity didn’t mix. Well, they could always buy candles. And if he found a way to plug up the gas lines, they could build a fire in the stove or something, cook their food around the fire like they were in the 1700s. Or still in the wizarding world. 

That got him thinking about whether or not gas stoves were popular in wizarding Britain, wishing he had thought to ask in his letter to Lucius. He was so caught up thinking about fuel sources that he didn’t notice Lily coming back inside (dressed this time). 

“Are you okay?” Her voice came from behind him, making him startle. 

“Uhh, yes?” He turned to her, “Probably, I was just thinking.” 

“Uh huh. Can I ask what about?” She raised a brow.

“The water, mostly. Then the gas, the power, then what the wizarding world does about fuel...” Severus trails off. He feels like he sounds silly, but he knows she wouldn't judge him. 

“Ah. Well, godspeed, Sev,” She shrugged, and took a look around the living room, “Where’d Duct Tape go?”

“I sent him off to the Malfoy’s,” he kept his eyes on the stove, thinking about how he could fit a good sized pot in there.

“Mm, alright.” she went over to kneel by her trunk, “I’m gonna go out for a little bit, could I borrow a jacket?” 

“Mine’s still with your stuff, feel free,” He looks her over for a second, “grab my cap, too. Just in case.”

She nods, digging through her things to find the hat and jacket and pulling out some of their money. “I’ll be back.”

He waves her off and just like that, she’s gone. 


	2. The Ethics of Hydrox

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lily and Severus going about their first day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *dabs* i unironically love writting this shit

_ June 14th 1975 _

Lily steps out the door and onto Looming Trace, an empty and grey street on the edges of Cokeworth. If she was able to, she would have ridden her bike to the nearest shop, but as she couldn’t go up to her house and steal the bike from her front yard, she would have to get used to walking. She also wasn't entirely sure when the shop was. 

She was glad to have Sev’s jacket and hat, just in case there was anyone around to recognize her. Severus was smaller than her and always had been, but all of his clothes were old and loose enough to fit the both of them, not matter how he or his mom tried to haphazardly tailor them. 

She tries not to think about it, but the thought of being found or recognized, especially by her parents, scares her. The thought’s been bugging her since they first started on this plan, stashing away cash from tutoring and figuring out all the shops and streets their parents frequented so they could avoid them. It would be so easy for them to be caught, anyone passing the street who noticed the smoke coming out of Severus’ lab or if someone followed Duct Tape back to them, it would be over. 

The thought of going back, sending her best friend back to that awful home made her sick. The fact she hadn't been able to do anything about it before was bad enough and she had  _ begged  _ her mom and dad to call someone or to take him in.

She’s lucky he neve- Oh Fuck.

She stumbled on a particularly jankey cobblestone, knocking her out of her thoughts. She righted herself just before she face planted, swiveling around to make sure no one had seen her flounder. The street was empty. As it had been. 

  
  


Lily made her way to the store eventually, years of classes across the castle at Hogwarts upping her stamina, the sides of the building plastered with faded and smogged over posters for old sales sodas she couldn't read the name of. She didn't bring much cash, they only had so much in their stash, but she wanted to get them both a treat for their first day on their own. 

She walked around the aisles, careful not to touch anything too much. There was a man behind the counter that eyed her every few minutes, like he thought she would grab something and run. Maybe she would. She'd never stolen anything bigger than a chapstick and that had been two years ago. 

She looked between her choices, a sleeve of cookies and a small case of colas. Usually she wasn't one to go back on her value, stealing was wrong, it was a deadly sin for a reason. But... given the situation, she was sure the angels wouldn't mind this once. She had seen Sev steal before, bags of bread, spreads and crisps to bring home when his father was out and the cupboards were near bare, and she didn't think he was sinning. And their own food supply would be pretty sparse for a while...

Lily looked back to the man at the register, making sure he was looking away, and grabbed the box of cookies, making a decision before she could chicken out. She shuffled them between her stomach and the waistband of her pants, smoothing Sev's jacket over it all and hoping it wouldn't be too obvious. 

Taking up the case of cokes, she brought it up to the counter, trying not to wince when the box dug into her skin just a bit too hard. She paid, wanting to rip the bills back from the man’s hands when she paid. She’d never had to think so hard about paying for anything before and she honestly wasn’t liking it. The man behind the counter gave her a look and shooed her off, going back to whatever it was he was doing before she came in. 

She walks until she’s out of eyesight of the shop windows, and takes the box out of her waistband. She lays it on top of the sodas and makes her way home.

*

“Albus,” Eileen snapped, peering up at the headmaster from the floo, “Where is my child.”

She was quiet, her words a harsh rasp that would still send a sharp chill down anyone’s spine. She may be stuck in a greying shack with no wand, no houselves, no security and a husband who didn’t know if he loved or hated her, but she was raised a Prince. She knew how to get what she wanted. 

“I assure you, Mrs. Snape, I don’t know.” The old man tried to placate her, “He’s not in the castle, he was seen getting on the train and before it can leave the station, we have to assure it’s empty.”

She hadn’t been to Hogwarts since she was a child, fresh and young, but she ripped her head from the fireplace and dug out an old cloak, determined to raze the castle to the ground before her husband was home. 

*

Severus sat in front of the oven, biting his lip as he tried to make ANY change at all to it. He knew very well he could do it, it was simple transfiguration, but doing so without a wand was so much harder. He tried again, pointing with his finger like he would a wand and trying to get the sides to move outwards. Obviously, nothing happened. 

He signed, laying back on the floor tiles for a break. Gods, his head was pounding. The dust on the ground wasn’t helping, tickling his nose and making him sneeze. He didn’t have anything to do until he got Lucius’ letter, except homework that he really didn’t want to do, so he didn’t have anything to keep his mind off all of this. 

He knew he wasn’t, but he still felt like he was forcing Lily to be there, to squat with him in an abandoned building instead of being warm, safe and loved in her own home. He could have run away on his own and just taken her with him when they were both seventeen, run away to America or France or New Zealand, somewhere far away where they could live their lives without a war hanging over them. No sides to choose, no houses to separate them. 

They could live together just like this, maybe in a wizarding village where he could sell potions and she could apprentice to be a curse breaker or something exciting like that (she was always drawn to the more dangerous, fun sounding professions). He could run his own apothecary, gardening and herbology both interested him and if his grades were anything to go by, he was good at them. Rosier told him once he would be the perfect heir if it weren't for his blood status and ‘unfortunate appearance’ (he actually said something much meaner, but he chose to ignore that). 

It took him a second to realize he was thinking fondly about Rosier. He blinked and sat up, rubbing at his eyes when he realized just how much they stung from staring up at the ceiling for who knows how long. He was about to jump back into trying to enlarge the oven, when the door opened. 

“Sev, did you not lock this?” Lily’s voice came in from the living room, “Literally anyone could have walked in here.”

He got up to meet her, “Well it’s not like we have a key.” He was curious about what she went out for and he could hear whatever it was rattling.

“Well yeah but,” she thought for a second, hiding whatever it is she bought behind her trunk, “I feel like one of us should be here all the time, right? We won’t go out together and leave the house alone.”

“Fair, but what if we do both need to go out?” 

“We’ll...” She thought, biting her lip just the same as he did, “We’ll leave the back door unlocked! No one’s gonna bother coming in from the back.”

Severus couldn’t find anything wrong with that at the moment. No one came around here at all, much less tried to sneak into the houses. The developers were long gone and anyone desperate enough to try and squat here probably already lived in the neighborhood. Still, he should think about ways to ensure nothing happens, he might ask Lucius about it in his next letter or even take a risk and send a note to one of the lestrange brothers. 

“Hey,” Lily brought him out of his thoughts, “what have you been doing since I left?”

“Trying to figure out some wandless spells,” He felt a little too embarrassed to say he was trying to make the oven bigger so they could use it as a fireplace. “Needless to say, it hasn’t been going well.”

“I get that, I was trying to practice this morning,” She sat on her trunk, “I swear I could fly and move my toys around as a kid, but now if I don’t have my wand I’m just stuck.”

“Yeah! I know how to do the spells, I know the words and the movements and all, but it just doesn’t seem to translate right.” He went to sit beside her on the ground, leaning against her trunk so his head was on her lap, “I can’t figure out why some things come easily and others don’t.”

“Y’know, Sev,” He felt her move back a bit, reaching behind her, “Maybe a treat would help you think?”

He felt something cold press up against his neck and jumped, looking back to see a glass cola bottle being held out to him. He grabbed his, and at Lily’s insistence, popped the lid off on the corner of her trunk. He took a long drink, the fizz almost choking him for a moment, and let out just the most embarrassing of burps. 

Lily laughed, cracking open her own and taking a drink, “Don’t get too excited, that’s only half of what I got.” 

She reached back again and pulled out a box of cookies, the name Hydrox written on the box in big chunky calligraphy. It took Severus a moment to pull together the fact that she had brought back two name brand items.

”How much did you pay for these?” he took the box, turning it over in his hands to try and find a price sticker. He wasn’t sure if he had ever even had these. 

“Well, nothing for those.” She shrugged, “Now open them, I deserve a cookie after going out.” 

“Lily!” He clutched the box to his chest, like the idea of her stealing them snacks was some grand betrayal, “Now I don’t know if you  _ do  _ deserve a cookie.”

“Alright, fair.” Lily nodded, eyes narrowing, “Counterpoint-”

She lunged at him, grabbing for the box. He scurried away, snickering when she hit the ground, and scrambled up to run into the kitchen before she could catch him. She came after him, of course, and didn’t catch him until both of them had hit their shins on the open oven door, slipped over the stairs going up and down and face planted in the living room.

  
  


Hours later and Severus walked out of his lab, the robes he slept under before thrown over his shoulders. It’s already dark and he can’t use his wand, so he’s carrying around a candle like a old man in a children's story. He didn’t have sleep clothes, so they both kind of had to deal with him sleeping in his boxers. He walked into their shared room where Lily was already sitting by her makeshift blanket, lazily going through one of her school books. 

He goes to lay his robe down beside her, placing the candle between them. They both sit to say their prayers and he blows out the candle for them to both go to sleep.

  
  


Then Duct Tape flies into the room like a silent killer and screams like he’s dying. 

*

_ Severus, _

_ I hope you’re settling in well in your new housing situation. I’m a bit busy, so I don’t have the time for a longer letter, but I’ve already collected your first few orders from me, Bellatrix, Rosier, Griffin and MacDonald. It hopefully shouldn’t put too much strain on your stores, but if you need anything, ask. _

_ I’ve sent a family owl along with Evan’s just in case. Her name is Evergreen and she should be fine to hunt on her own. _

_ Narcissa sends her regards as well as the attached package and letter. _

_ Best Regards, _

_ Lucius Malfoy _

*

_ Severus and Lily, _

_ I’m glad to hear you’ve both found a place to set up, though I can only imagine the atmosphere of the place. To help you both out, I’ve sent a few pillows, blankets, candles, and a small bag of those caramels Rodolphus bought for you last year. No matter what he says, I can assure you Lucius helped me pick out and pack these.  _

_ Severus, you’ve been a great addition to our house since the moment you were sorted, though you don’t like to acknowledge it, and I would be a fool not to make sure you know it. I know you have no interest in fighting, but you would be a great asset to the war when you get older. I won’t be able to tell you this next time we meet in person, but I hope that wherever you end up, you continue to use that talent for the best. _

_ Lily, I realize we haven’t had any time to speak and I won’t lie about my distaste for muggles and muggleborns by extension, but you’re a friend of Severus’s and nothing good will come of bad blood between us. The pun was not intended. Know that you can reach out to me if trouble arises, and I will do what I can to help. I care a great deal for Severus and I want what’s best for the both of you.  _

_ Write soon,  _

_ Narcissa Black _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> owo I promise cissa and lucius arent always this nice or... sappy. its extenuating circumstances.


	3. The Smell of Freedom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Talking and finding and b u r n i n g.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am becoming increasingly aware that i write for this story when i have a shitton of energy and nothing to put it into
> 
> also, never leave a flame unattended!

_ June 15th, 1975 _

“Severus, this is the most comfortable a floor has been since the last time my parents put new carpet in,” Lily looked over to him, shrouded in a huge fluffy comforter and puffy pillows, “I don’t think I want to move.”

Severus was in much the same position, wrapped in a softer blanket then he’s ever felt laying on two pillows that felt like he imagined a cloud would. “Lily, Lils, if you don’t give me a reason to get up right now, I don’t think I ever will.”

She sighed, evidently deciding to be the responsible one between them, “Well... you have to start working on your potion orders.” she picked herself up off the ground, “And I should start doing... something. Homework maybe.”

“Ew,” Severus snickered, “why don’t you just help me in the lab?”

“I mean, I could, but also,” She flicked him in the forehead, “I do not want to. Plus, you’re not allowed to ew at me, you actually like doing essays.”

She got up and walked out of the room, leaving him to either burrow further into his blanket (what he wanted to do) or get up, put some clothes on and get to work (what he had to do.) He got up, eventually, with a groan, the cold air immediately hitting him when he untangled himself from the blanket. He stretched and pushed his bedthings away into a corner in lieu of, say, folding them and went to put on some clothes.

He grabbed some ill fitting shorts and a shirt from his trunk and dressed quickly, coming down the stairs as fast as he could without slipping, wanting to get downstairs before Lily could finish off the cookies. 

“So, what’s up first, Sev?” Lily calls from the kitchen when he rounds the stairs, sitting on the small counter and swinging her legs. 

“Uh, Lucius and MacDonald’s are gonna take a few days, so I’ll have to get to those first, but Bella needs belladonna and opium extract so I can't start on that until I can get my hands on opium.” He cracks a cola open on the edge of the counter, happy to have any amount of caffeine, “Griffin wants a fire resistance potion, so I should be able to get that done today, though.”

“And Rosier?”

“Just a Euphoria Elixir and a Draught of peace,” He shrugged, “Honestly, I should still have some left over from making him so many during the school year.”

“The wizarding world needs to invest in antidepressants,” Lily clicked her teeth, “I don't  _ like  _ Rosier, but he was like half of your business during the school year.”

“Yeeeah, he’s going through a lot right now,” Severus scrunched his nose, “galleons be damned, I’m kind of worried about him. How’s he gonna function if I’m not there?”

Lily shrugged and pulled the peanut butter out of the cabinet behind them, “Maybe if he actually gets help he won't be so much of a dick.”

He hmm'd, figuring that at some point  _ someone  _ would give a shit about Rosier's mental state and it wouldn't have to be him. He moved to grab a knife from the little pack of plastic cutlery they had gotten, the hope that they would be having peanut butter sandwiches for breakfast dying inside him when he turned around and he watched his best friend, whom he loves and respects, sticking her fucking fingers into the peanut butter. The communal peanut butter. 

"Lily," he puts down the knife and cola, purely to stop his urge to throw them at her, "Give me the peanut butter."

"But Sev," she mumbled through a mouth full of her own grubby finger, "I'm eating it."

“Now, Lily!” He grabbed at the jar, but she was quick to hop off the counter, peanut butter hugged to her chest, and bolt into the living room. He couldn't get a day of peace could he?

*

By the time Severus  _ finally  _ got Lily to eat like a human being and made them both food, he was on the verge of the kind of headache people drill holes in their skulls to fix. He just wants to sit down, finish his sandwich and go upstairs to zone out in his lab for a while. 

"What good do you think doing homework is going to do?" He asks despite himself, looking up at Lily from across the small kitchen. 

"Well, we don't know if we're going back to school," she shrugged, tugging little bits of crust off her sandwich to try and feed to Duct Tape who was having absolutely none of it, “And it gives me something to do while you’re working.”

“Well, like I said, you could come up and help me out.”

“Well, I  _ could  _ but we’re gonna be eating and sleeping and living together for at least the next three months, I’ve gotta have some time when I’m not attached to you at the hip,” She stood, flicking her last bit of crust at him, “And either way, If we don’t go back, I wanna make sure I get as much education as I can as soon as I can. I don’t want to have to bum off Malfoy forever because we missed magical algebra.”

“That’s fair,” he brushes his shirt, even though the crust got nowhere near him, “Maybe there's something in all that busy work that’ll help me figure out how to transfigure things wandlessly.”

“Yeah, Maybe,” She trailed off, shuffling around for a moment of silence, “I, uh, might go out again, try to find some cool stuff to bring home.”

“Godspeed, Lils,” He picked himself up to clap her on the shoulders, “I’ll be here.”

*

Eileen had torn apart a castle, nearly stripped the upholstery off of a train, personally threatened the headmaster of Hogwarts, called in three favors she had never wanted to have to call in and nearly beheaded a houself and came home with nothing to show for it but a hungry husband and an empty second bedroom.

“If he wants to run off on his own, let him,” Tobias tells her, sitting at their small table, waiting for a breakfast that never came, “That’s one less mouth to feed until he pussys out and comes back home.”

“He’s just a boy, Tobias,” She hisses, “He doesn’t know how to be on his own.”

“He has a knife, Leen,” he shrugs, “I taught the boy to fight myself, he’ll be fine.”

She doesn’t say anything else, doesn’t bother, is busy thinking about where her boy could be as she goes through the motions of heating beans and bread just to get her husband out the door for the day. 

She knows the types her Severus hangs around at school, Malfoy, Rosier, Black, Mulciber, all respectable names, no doubt taking her boy in after seeing his aptitude for magic, his potion skills, his intellect. She had even dug her old practice wand out of her old chest of things she’d taken from the manor before she was disowned, taught him as large an arsenal of hexes, jinxes and curses as she could. 

She had given that boy as much as she could to keep his head above water, to keep him running with the purebloods around him because she would be damned if she sent him into the shark tank that was Hogwarts with nothing to his name like a mudblo-

She stopped what she was doing, and turned to her husband, “Do you remember where that little ginger Severus likes lives?”

*

Lily left the house in Severus’ jacket again, shoving her hands in the deep pockets as far as they’ll go. 

She walked down and around Looming Trace slowly, poking her head around houses and testing doorknobs to see just how many potentials squats they had in the neighborhood and looking inside when she could. Occasionally she would stick around one house, checking out old graffiti or suspicious dirt mounds or climbing up back walls to check out what people had abandoned in their backyards. 

She found old boots (most that she really didn’t want to touch, but one pair she was sure she could scrape the mud off and they’d be just fine so she grabs them), mismatched hammers and wrenches that she dropped into the pockets of her jacket, trusting the old army wear to hold up. It wasn't stealing if the stuff was just laying around for the taking.

She finds a place with the windows broken in and almost cuts herself playing around with the broken glass surrounding the opening like teeth. Still, it's more fun than going in through the door. She bundles her hand into the sleeve of the jacket and uses her shielded fist to break up the last glass shards hanging onto the window frame and hops right in.

She's looking around and sees dusty floors, yellowing wallpaper, small space, all par for the course. She still checked around anyways. Sadly, unless these people had a trap door somewhere, there's nothing worthwhile in the living room. Obviously, she goes to the kitchen where she finds just a  _ wild  _ amount of bleach and what she could only assume were jars of preserved meat. 

She was about to give up on the place when she took the chance to go upstairs, going through the main bedroom and finding nothing bigger and better than an old used up lipstick. She finally tried for the second bedroom and Jesus was she glad she did! 

Right in front of her, leaned against the wall like a gift, was a pair of rollerskates. Not like the shoe kind Petunia’s friend Janet had, the screw on kind people used when she was a kid. She picks them up, looks them over like she has any idea how to tell if they're in good shape. Obviously old, rusty, probably needs new wheels, sure, but the thought of fixing them up and zooming down the neighborhood with them was just. Too good. 

She sticks them into the muddy boots she had thrown around her neck, figuring it doesn’t matter if she looks a little weird, and makes her way back home.

  
  


Lily could smell acrid smoke as soon as she got close to the front door, and almost turned all the way around. It was so bad, she could see Duct Tape preening to get the smoke out of his feathers three houses away. As soon as she could open the door and throw down her new finds, she ran upstairs to see what was going on.

“Sev! Sev, open the fucking door!” She banged on the door to Severus’ lab, holding her nose desperate to keep out whatever rancid smell was wafting out.

“Uhh, Подождите минутку!” he called from inside over the clanging and fumbling of him trying to fix whatever it was that got messed up before he had to answer her. 

When he finally opened the door, just enough to stick his head out, a cloud of nasty smelling  _ something  _ puffing out around him. “Uh, hey, Lils.”

“Oh hell, what is that?” She pushed passed him into the lab, looking for the source of the smell.

“I can only assume it’s armadillo bile,” Sev pointed her to one of his burners, flame as high as he could safely get it, puffing brown smoke, “It must have leaked over my burners in my trunk, so I have to burn it off now so it doesn’t smoke every time I use it.”

“I can smell it from outside, you're gonna get the cops called on us,” she tried to fan the smoke out the window, knowing it was futile and starting to feel genuinely nauseous (which isn’t a great feeling when you're living off peanut butter sandwiches). 

“Yeah, speaking of outside, we should probably get going,” he grabbed Lily and pulled her out of the room, leaving the door open so it could air out, “My burners are all charmed not to tip over or anything, so It’s probably okay to leave it alone.”

“Yeah, alright let’s go!”


End file.
